Persian Textiles — Woollen Stuffs 497 



tioned in the Ming history as having been sent as a present in 1392 from 

 Samarkand. The Ming Geography, as stated by Bretschneider, 1 

 mentions this stuff as a manufacture of Bengal and So-li, saying that 

 it is woven from wool and is downy. There is a red and a green kind. 

 Bretschneider's view, that by sa-ha-la the Persian ia/ is intended, must 

 be rejected. 2 In the Yin yai leh Ian of 1416, sa-ha-la is enumerated 

 among the goods shipped from Malacca, being identified by Groene- 

 veldt with Malayan saklat or sahalat. 3 Sa-ha-la is further mentioned 

 for Ormuz and Aden. 4 



In the Ko ku yao lun $&• "& 5* H, written by Ts'ao Cao W B3 in 

 1387, revised and enlarged in 1459 by Wan Tso 3E t*c, 5 we meet this 

 word in the transcription $§ ( = $5) M ffl sa-hai-la, 6 which is said to 

 come from Tibet IS # in pieces three feet in width, woven from wool, 

 strong and thick like felt, and highly esteemed by Tibetans. Under the 

 heading p'u-lo laf ft ( = Tibetan p'rug) 1 it is said in the same work that 

 this Tibetan woollen stuff resembles sa-Jtai-la. 



Persian sakirlat, sagirlat, has been placed on a par with Chinese 

 sa-ha-la by T. Watters 8 and A. Houtum-Schindler; 9 it is not this 

 Persian word, however, that is at the root of Chinese sa-ha-la, but 

 saqalat or saqalldt, also saqalat, saqalldf ("scarlet cloth"). Dr. E. D. 

 Ross 10 has been so fortunate as to discover in a Chinese-Persian vocabu- 

 lary of 1549 the equation: Chinese sa-ha-la = Persian saqalat. This settles 

 the problem definitely. There is, further, Persian saqldfiin or saqldfin, 

 said to mean "a city in Rum where scarlet cloth is made, scarlet cloth 

 or dress made from it." The latter name is mentioned as early as 

 a.d. 1040 and 1 150 by Baihaki and Edrlsi respectively. 11 According to 

 Edrisi, it was a silk product of Almeria in Spain, which is doubtless 

 meant by the city of Rum. Yaqut tells of its manufacture in Tabriz, 



1 Mediaeval Researches, Vol. II, p. 258. 



a Regarding the Chinese transcription of this Persian word, see Rockhill, T'oung 

 Pao, 191 5, p. 459. 



3 Notes on the Malay Archipelago, p. 253. 



* Rockhill, T'oung Pao, 1915, pp. 444, 606, 608. It does not follow from the 

 text, however, that sa-ha-la was a kind of thin veiling or gauze, as the following 

 term (or terms) £|| -{5£ is apparently a matter in itself. 



5 Ch. 8, p. 4 b (ed. of Si yin huan Is'un Su). 



9 This mode of writing is also given in the C'an wu li, cited above. 



7 T'oung Pao, 1914, p. 91. 



8 Essays on the Chinese Language, p. 342. v 



9 Journal As. Soc. Bengal, Vol. VI, 1910, p. 265. 



10 Journal As. Soc. Bengal, Vol. IV, 1908, p. 403. 



11 Yule, Hobson-Jobson, p. 861. 



